ectrimble dev log

so will this medium gun be a carbine of some sort? maybe a fast firing semi auto sort of gun? i do like the idea of different tiers of armor protecting against different things. do you think you could do it so that armor uses power and the lower the tier the less efficient it is?

ex: you have tier one armor with 20 charge and have a creeper explode next to you. you are now at 10 charge.ex2: same thing except tier two armor. creeper explodes, now you have 15 charge (only lost 5).

maybe you could do it with two damage bars (kinda like halo) with the charge being like an overshield and then actual durability going down at a much quicker rate once your charge is gone.

Well to start armor is going to be just plain old armor, just with different strengths based on the materials.

Once I get my alpha build completed, I'll start focusing on items a bit more intensely.

A shield would be a neat add-on and definitely worth perusing. If I'm able to encoroperate a shield system, I'll make the weapons have different properties against the shield as opposed to the armor itself.

Well to start armor is going to be just plain old armor, just with different strengths based on the materials.

Once I get my alpha build completed, I'll start focusing on items a bit more intensely.

A shield would be a neat add-on and definitely worth perusing. If I'm able to encoroperate a shield system, I'll make the weapons have different properties against the shield as opposed to the armor itself.

Exactly the kind of balancing system we are in need of. You have certain weapons effective against certain armours, while certain armours effective against certain weapons.

that sounds cool but how do you think you would go about upgrades? would it be just adding things on a crafting bench or would you have a new system? my personal favorite for making guns and such is Flan's approach where there is a gun box that has the amount a materials and the gun, but no recipe and no intermediate parts to make it. it is very streamlined and effective imo.

Well took this evening off, needed a break, been coding a Perl PDF form generator the last 2 days, friggn headache there, not really hard just really tedious.

Anyway, I'm not sure on the upgrade system yet. I've thought about a component upgrade system, like new barrel etc, but whats the point as you should be able to just build the improved weapon, I've also thought about addons, but really, I think the most practical will be a base item, upgraded in stages (the first method) with a few tweaks.

Like say a Base Bolter would be T1, upgrade the Barrel with light alloy and you get T2 or something like that, not 100% yet.

On a side note, I was thrown off my progress as I've run into an error that I've got to track down. Would appear that my EntityBolterRound is causing issues with other entities as it has so far crashed the game anytime I have it set to easy/normal/hard with hostile mobs spawning. Not sure exactly where the problem is as the error report doesn't give me a specific area of failure outside of Entity movement, which I suspect is conflicting with the method I created for the round.

To surmount this problem, I'm probably going to rework my bullets, possibly try to figure out how Flan and the others have done their "invisible" projectiles for the bolter and ripper (medium rifle) then work out the projectile entity for the JackHammer (my aptly named RPG like weapon). But regardless if I'm unable to quickly fix the problem I'll move on to armor and come back when I've had time to breath lol.

I'm not sure if he does a blank render or if there's a way to cause "point and click" target damage of some sort. I'm going to dig through his code and see if I can't find anything useful to go off of, not going to steal the code, just see how its done and see if I can mimic it.

suppose my main objective is to take what I'm doing now and make it a bit more fluid.

BTW, how are you gona make it so only us can use them? And are each of the secret things going to be usable by the person who asked for it? Or all of the dev team?

Edit: I just got a idea for my item: The Subspace Pocket Space Shifter(TSPSS).

The TSPSS would be a item I spawn with thats stored in a extra slot in my inventory (like a armor spot, but just for the TSPSS), if in it's specalized spot then it wouldn't drop on death, if it isn't then on death it transfers to it's spot (and still doesn't drop). When in the hotbar it can be right-clicked to instantly teleport into a zero gravity, empty, 16x16 version of the End (except that holding rightclick for a second places a block into the air in front of you) This might not seem too useful, but this area would be exactly the same, everywhere. Singleplayer, multiplayer, different servers, anywhere you(I) go it would be the same, same blocks, items, and even mobs. Rightclicking a player/mob moves them into that area, though I could probably agree on something if me trapping people is a concern. Teleportation is also instant, no matter where you(I) are(am), the area is always loaded and the area you were in is still loaded in the background for instant teleportation back.

This would obviously require the Copernicus framework, but all in all wouldn't be hard in any paticular aspect once it's done. The persistance thing would be easy considering you(I) could store a copy of it locally and transfer it to servers when joining one(nothing much considering we're planning on moving spaceships as much as 100x bigger).

I'll figure the rest of the details out later, I just hope this isn't too hard.

Sounds good, but if its stored locally then people could open the map in an editor and add stuff. Should probably be stored on their "home" server and transferred server to server.If they have access to the file it isn't going to be very non-hackable.Also- people who run servers are gonna have to be very trustworthy to not edit the map file directly, even if you lock out /give.

Sounds good, but if its stored locally then people could open the map in an editor and add stuff. Should probably be stored on their "home" server and transferred server to server.If they have access to the file it isn't going to be very non-hackable.Also- people who run servers are gonna have to be very trustworthy to not edit the map file directly, even if you lock out /give.

Its supposed to be a me/dev team only item, and im suuurrrre we're all trustworthy enough to not edit it

Description: The MAS is capable of reorganizing the molecular structure of any object, able to convert it into another object or compound at will. It draws the energy it needs directly from SubSpace, so nothing is required to run it. It always stays with me, because upon my death, It converts half the items in my inventory into a teleportation matrix and teleports back to me. The only limitation is that, due to the Law of Conservation of Mass, you need enough mass to create something. Every Item and block has a number for it's mass, and I can only make objects with the amount of mass I have or less. Every item put into the matrix is disintegrated and stored in it's Mass Storage container, which can hold up to 640 mass points. To make an object, It takes mass from this storage tank and creates the Item. In addition, it can turn mass into energy, using the same mass numbers and feeding it directly into nearby energy storage units or power cells. This Item is uncraftable and I have the only one in existance, as the technology to make them was lost along with the Antioch empire when their home system collapsed into a black hole.

Hey every, just so you all know, I'm in the process of moving. My development is on hold for about another week, week and a half depending on how long it takes to get set back up at the new place. Just spent friggn 12 hours painting today, so I have no brain power left.

Anywho, I'll be dropping in periodically to check up on stuff and see where everything is. Oh, I'm also waiting on 1.0.0 MPC/Modloader to be stabilized so I can port over to the release stuff (of course it probably is, I'm just too tired to go looking right now).

Description: The MAS is capable of reorganizing the molecular structure of any object, able to convert it into another object or compound at will. It draws the energy it needs directly from SubSpace, so nothing is required to run it. It always stays with me, because upon my death, It converts half the items in my inventory into a teleportation matrix and teleports back to me. The only limitation is that, due to the Law of Conservation of Mass, you need enough mass to create something. Every Item and block has a number for it's mass, and I can only make objects with the amount of mass I have or less. Every item put into the matrix is disintegrated and stored in it's Mass Storage container, which can hold up to 640 mass points. To make an object, It takes mass from this storage tank and creates the Item. In addition, it can turn mass into energy, using the same mass numbers and feeding it directly into nearby energy storage units or power cells. This Item is uncraftable and I have the only one in existance, as the technology to make them was lost along with the Antioch empire when their home system collapsed into a black hole.

Hey, I make manmade textures for stuff. Don't I get something?

So you basically want me to rewrite the entire game engine for your super block from a black hole? How about a nice suit of armor? lol

is it possible to make a sprite that is say... four times the size of a normal sprite so it would be 32*32 but it would also render in your hand as 32*32 so you could have an extra long spear or sniper rifle (random examples)? just a quick question really, though i don't see a practical purpose , i think it would be cool

Description: The MAS is capable of reorganizing the molecular structure of any object, able to convert it into another object or compound at will. It draws the energy it needs directly from SubSpace, so nothing is required to run it. It always stays with me, because upon my death, It converts half the items in my inventory into a teleportation matrix and teleports back to me. The only limitation is that, due to the Law of Conservation of Mass, you need enough mass to create something. Every Item and block has a number for it's mass, and I can only make objects with the amount of mass I have or less. Every item put into the matrix is disintegrated and stored in it's Mass Storage container, which can hold up to 640 mass points. To make an object, It takes mass from this storage tank and creates the Item. In addition, it can turn mass into energy, using the same mass numbers and feeding it directly into nearby energy storage units or power cells. This Item is uncraftable and I have the only one in existance, as the technology to make them was lost along with the Antioch empire when their home system collapsed into a black hole.

Hey, I make manmade textures for stuff. Don't I get something?

So you basically want me to rewrite the entire game engine for your super block from a black hole? How about a nice suit of armor? lol

The entire engine? There could be a config file for how much each item/block id increases the storage, the value of the storage can be stored as damage, to add energy to storages shouldn't be any groundbreaking feat(depends on how we handle energy in general) and for creating items its pretty much just the same as deconstructing them into storage. Keeping the device itself and half the items wouldn't be hard either, and Notch often makes it so he spawns with diamond tools when testing something thats in developement, so that wouldn't be hard either.

Also, what do you think of my idea? I'm worried that I might be asking for way too much for my position, but I can't think it would be TOO hard. Extra inv slots have been done before and from what I can't tell arn't too difficult to do, the subspace pocket could just be treated like a ship thats transfered to a server when I(or someone else, im still not sure if these special things are only for us or all the teammembers) connect, and from what I understand of the Copernicus framework it will allow things like loading Cubic Chunks into the background while not displaying/generating a World Renderer. Mineup changes the background whenever you change dimensions, and since we are planning on using that the framework would be in place allready.

As for the device transfering to the extra slot on death, its been done multiple times before where something doesn't drop on death, and im sure it can't be too hard to move it into that extra slot when you(or I) respawn. From what I can understand inventory and inventory-interface modification is relativily easy. Oh, and I got a better idea for the name then the TSPSS, the Fulcrum ARea Teleporter.

Oh, almost forgot the teleportation, again not much considering Minecraft can generate a single World Renderer in as little as a frame or two, add a few little particle effects and the Endermen teleport sound and boom, done. Theres the problem of teleporting back into something, but then you could call the spawn position selection code to find a nearby spot.

The length of the explaination makes it seem more complex then it really is.

Well I was kinda being sarcastic about that one there buggy, just found it entertaining that everyone thinks that because I'm tossing a custom suit of armor into the game for Shiva, that everyone is getting custom items.

I like the ideas people are tossing out there more for idea conception in general, not because I'm actually going to build them their little easter egg.

Your break-down of the way the code works was pretty good too btw.

Oh and for future reference, if anyone wants a 'special' item, keep it simple. Not because I'm lazy and hate you , but because once I get back into the swing of things, I'll be devoting my time towards general game use items and making stuff work with the game, not easter eggs for dev members, that stuff can be patched in at a later date. Once we have a release and I can sit back a bit, then I'll be more compelled to spend some time on special items for people.

Quote :

is it possible to make a sprite that is say... four times the size of a normal sprite so it would be 32*32 but it would also render in your hand as 32*32 so you could have an extra long spear or sniper rifle (random examples)? just a quick question really, though i don't see a practical purpose , i think it would be cool

I have no idea about this. I'd have to dig into the render engine a bit to be able to answer that.

Well I was kinda being sarcastic about that one there buggy, just found it entertaining that everyone thinks that because I'm tossing a custom suit of armor into the game for Shiva, that everyone is getting custom items.

I like the ideas people are tossing out there more for idea conception in general, not because I'm actually going to build them their little easter egg.

Your break-down of the way the code works was pretty good too btw.

Oh and for future reference, if anyone wants a 'special' item, keep it simple. Not because I'm lazy and hate you , but because once I get back into the swing of things, I'll be devoting my time towards general game use items and making stuff work with the game, not easter eggs for dev members, that stuff can be patched in at a later date. Once we have a release and I can sit back a bit, then I'll be more compelled to spend some time on special items for people.

Quote :

is it possible to make a sprite that is say... four times the size of a normal sprite so it would be 32*32 but it would also render in your hand as 32*32 so you could have an extra long spear or sniper rifle (random examples)? just a quick question really, though i don't see a practical purpose , i think it would be cool

I have no idea about this. I'd have to dig into the render engine a bit to be able to answer that.

Ok, I have a idea then, my idea for a item could be turned into a high tech block-somethingorother that can be used to store things inside a subspace pocket, but be REALLY expensive to make. It should also use a lot of power so that a frigate can't have the cargo capacity of a 250k block barge.

Fine. Forget the MAS. Instead, make me something that kills anyone I have Line Of Sight with when i click on them... instantly. It also ALWAYS stays with me and doesn't drop on death. Call it the Molecular Atomic Vaporizer, the MAV. It requires no energy, due to it's energy coming from subspace.